


Wake Me Up

by goddessofcruelty



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Episode s03e06 Guilty, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-13
Updated: 2014-12-01
Packaged: 2018-02-25 06:17:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2611478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddessofcruelty/pseuds/goddessofcruelty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Never.” Roy Harper clings to the memory of that voice, promising him that his mentor, the Arrow, would never give up on him, would never abandon him to this. Sometimes the voice gets drowned out by the screams, screams that he's only just aware are his, but it always comes back, wraps around Roy like a soft blanket that protects him from whatever they're trying to do to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Never

“ _Never.”_

Roy Harper clings to the memory of that voice, promising him that his mentor, the Arrow, would never give up on him, would _never_ abandon him to this.

Sometimes the voice gets drowned out by the screams, screams that he's only just aware are his, but it always comes back, wraps around Roy like a soft blanket that protects him from whatever they're trying to do to him.

At first, he'd threatened and blustered, furious and ashamed that he'd been caught, trailed to his roof perch by a drops of blood after an arrow nicked him, one with a poisoned tip, because he'd become dizzy and unable to stand. The last thing he'd seen was the distinctive black of the League of Assassins.

They wanted to know who the Arrow was, but Roy's shoved that so far down in his consciousness that he doesn't even know anymore. He can't tell them what he doesn't know, and he doesn't know if the Mirakuru changed his body, or if training with the Arrow has toughened him, but for all the pain, there's never any lasting damage.

Roy doesn't think too hard on it, just listens to the voice in his head, and clings to the promise as his link to sanity.

-

“Three weeks, Diggle!” Oliver slams his fist down on the counter. “ _Three_. Who knows what they've done to him? We've got to find him!”

John stifles a yawn, exhausted from not sleeping since forever, shrugs wearily. “Maybe you should just let it go, he's always been a bit of a liability.”

“I will _never_ give up on Roy,” Oliver rounds on Diggle, who just shrugs and walks over to Felicity, who's watching Oliver sadly, as he starts going through his exercises, to work off his anger.

Felicity turns to John, who arches a brow, to which she shrugs. “He feels responsible for Roy.”

He looks up at Ollie. “I think it's more than that.”

Felicity tilts her head. “You okay?”

Diggle runs his hand over his face. “Tired. Sara's teething. Not getting much shut-eye.”

Felicity hesitates. “Lyla...?”

“Gone.” John sets his jaw and shrugs, indicating that he's done with that conversation.

They both watch Oliver for a long moment, then she looks up at Diggle. “I think we could all use some coffee.”

John stifles another yawn and nods, grabs his coat and heads out.

Olive keeps punching things while Felicity tries desperately to think of something she could do.

-

The leader of the League looks down at the mess of a man strapped down to the table, still conscious, but barely, mumbling “Never,” the only thing he's said in the last month. Just that word repeated over and over.

“Heal him.”

“Again, sir? I doubt he'll give us anything.”

One look is enough to make the torturer shrink back and bow his head. “It will be done.”

Ra's al Ghul looks the man – boy, really – over one more time.

“He _will_ tell us who the Arrow is.”

Roy's mumbled, “Never” serves as a counterpoint to the older man's certainty, and he considers a long moment.

“Bring him to full consciousness. Tell him we'll start taking his fingers. Hard to shoot without those.”

The man nods once more, not looking al Ghul in the eye.

As soon as the man sweeps through the door, the torturer pushes a button, and a tiny old lady in a wheelchair is brought in. Her hand is lifted, the glove pulled free, and then her hand is placed carefully in Roy's.

They both start screaming.

-

“Oliver, I've got something.” Felicity's voice wavers as he and Diggle run over from where they'd been sparring to peer over her shoulder.

“I just got a ping on Nyssa from the facial recognition. It's only a 40% match but it's the only thing we've got in weeks.”

“Where, Felicity?” Oliver is already suiting up.

“I'm sending the coordinates to your phone now.”

Diggle follows him out, and Felicity's left alone, crossing her fingers that they can find Nyssa and get some information from her. And that there's someone left to rescue.

-

Roy becomes aware that there's been no pain for a while now. He's staring blankly at a solid white ceiling, until he hears a noise that he dimly recognizes at the door opening. Roy hears footsteps and then feels a sharp pain in his bicep.

Thirty seconds later, Roy feels a surge of something going through him, and his apathy turns into a tension and a hyper-awareness of everything. And those parts of his brain that had withdrawn in the face of torture are dragged back online, and he blinks and then turns his head.

“Who – ?”

“You are with the League of Assassins, Mr. Harper. I am Dr. Moon. You've been with us a year now. Valiantly resisting all of our attempts to make a useful asset of you. But, Mr. Harper, I have broken better men than you.”

Moon leans back and slides a tray of implements into Roy's line of vision. “If we can't make use of you for ourselves, we will make sure that no one else can use you either.” He holds up one of the devices as Roy's eyes widen.

“I use this to crush fingers. I hear those are absolutely necessary for your line of work. Now tell me, Mr. Harper, which finger is most important to an archer?”

Roy's hand twitches involuntarily, and the torturer smiles. “Ah yes, thank you.” He lifts Roy's hand into the device, clucking his tongue in sympathy to the look on Roy's face as he tries to move his hand without effect. “Oh, I forgot to mention. I've temporarily paralyzed you. It can be made permanent if necessary.”

Moon finishes securing Roy's hand and then runs a thumb over the gleaming metal, and then turns to look down at the wide eyes, now leaking tears.

“One last chance, Mr. Harper. Who is the Arrow?”

-

Roy's screams are the first thing Oliver and Diggle hear as they creep up to the warehouse that Nyssa had sent them to. John has to hold him back.

“It's no good if you get yourself killed as well, Oliver. _Think_!”

“Felicity?” Oliver growls into the earpiece.

“Far side of the building, access vent.”

Oliver is gone before Felicity finishes, and John sets his jaw and follows as best he can.

-

Roy's hands are throbbing masses of pain, and he can't even tell the individual fingers apart any more, not even when Doctor Moon lifts them each up individually, clucking sympathetically over them.

“You'll never be useful to the Arrow again, I'm afraid. Not that he's shown any interest in coming for you. After all this time, Mr. Harper, there's just no hope.”

Roy tries to remember that voice, wills himself to sink back into that safe darkness, but all he hears is the torturer's chuckle.

“The drug I gave you ensures that you won't pass out from the pain, dear boy. You'll go mad first.” Moon looks thoughtful. “I wonder how long that will take.”

Roy shuts his eyes tight and sets his jaw, which is why he doesn't see the shaft that pierces Doctor Moon's arm as he reaches for the torture device once more. They do fly open at Oliver's Arrow voice, and for a terrible minute, Roy thinks he's actually gone insane.

“Back away from him. Right. Now.”

Moon winces, arm hanging as he drops the device and moves slightly away from Roy. “You'll never make it out of here,” he says, whatever speech he'd been planning stopped by an arrow through the throat.

“You talk too much,” Oliver growls and then hurries to undo Roy's restraints, hidden eyes wide and worried as Roy doesn't move.

“Is that...really...you?” Roy manages, eyes desperately looking for some sign that this is real.

“Yeah, Roy,” Oliver says, brushes the hair back from Roy's head. “I'm really here.”

“Paralyzed,” Roy grunts, “My hands?”

Oliver looks at them and then turns his head away a minute. “We'll worry about that later. Right now we need to get you out of here.”

“There's...woman...wheelchair. Touch heals.”

Oliver stares at Roy for a second, then looks up. “Diggle, find that woman.”

When John has vanished into the building, Oliver pulls the limp Roy into his arms, and he looks up at his hero.

“I knew you'd never give up on me.”

Oliver holds him tight, smiling through the threatening tears.

“ _Never_.”

 


	2. Always

“ _Always_.”

Oliver Queen lays in his bed, alone in his bed, in his apartment rented under an assumed name, a tiny place only Diggle – and now Roy – knows of, and thinks about it, about the way Roy had answered his question.

Ollie had asked, _“Do you trust me?”_ and the response was not only immediate and absolutely certain, but with a hint of a scoff in it. _“Always,”_ Roy had said with the tone of “What a stupid question. Did you really have to ask?”

Oliver thinks about that moment a lot, had thought about it every night while those bastards had Roy. He doesn't understand, has _never_ understood the way Roy feels about him. He's a killer, Oliver is, and especially when he was focused on his vengeance and wrapped up in being the Vigilante, he did so many terrible things.

Roy _knows_ this, knows all of it. Oliver had sat him down and told him the entire story, things that he hadn't even told Felicity or Diggle yet, trying to quash that hero-worship, to convince the boy that this was not a good life to live, and he, Oliver Queen, was not a good man.

Roy had listened, listened to all of it patiently, absorbing everything Oliver had to tell him, and then reached out and settled his hand on the older man's shoulder, squeezing lightly, and lifting those blue eyes up, and then proved he hadn't been listening at all.

Oliver can still see the twenty-three year old tilting his head and smiling, her his voice filled with belief, belying his natural cynicism in regard to anything else. _“Oliver, you're the best man there is.”_

Shaking his head to dispel the memory, Oliver shoves the covers off in disgust and slides from his bed. It's to be another sleepless night, it seems, and so Ollie does what he always does when he can't sleep. He starts working out.

For the next two hours, while Roy sleeps the deep sleep of the drugged in his barely-large-enough-to-call-a-room guestroom, Oliver spars with a small dummy, does push-ups, pull-ups, anything that will occupy him. By the time he's tired enough to reconsider bed, Oliver's also dripping with sweat.

He heads into the single bathroom that the two rooms share and turns the knob to get the shower going. In a place like this, where the landlord doesn't ask questions, the plumbing is ancient, and it takes a long while for the water to get warm.

Oliver shucks his workout things and looks at himself in the mirror. _You're going to be thirty in a few months, he reminds himself_ , eying the face that looks back for signs of age. He recalls the days before he left on that fateful trip, thinking he'd never make it this far. Oliver shakes his head at his retrospection and climbs into the tiny tub, turning the water as hot as it will go.

His skin is reddened by the time he climbs out, and the breath of cold air as he steps from behind the curtain feels comforting as Oliver wraps the towel around him, and then heads back into his room. And stops a few steps in, because Roy's perched at the end of his bed. Oliver knows he didn't walk into the wrong room, though he surreptitiously checks just in case, but no, Roy is in his bedroom, and Oliver's first thought is to worry.

“Roy? Everything okay?”

Roy looks up, lips parted to say something to Oliver, but instead his eyes go wide as he takes in his mentor wrapped in nothing but a green towel. Oliver tilts his head as Roy opens and closes his mouth a few times, then goes pale, then flushes.

“Roy?” Oliver steps closer.

The boy closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I'm fine. Couldn't...sleep.” He gets up and heads toward the door. “I'll just...make us a snack.” And he pushes through, then closes the door firmly behind him.

Oliver furrows a brow, then shakes his head and shrugs at Roy's odd reaction before looking down at himself. It's not like Roy hasn't seen his scars before. Maybe he was having nightmares still, though he hadn't woken up screaming in a week now.

Putting it out of his mind, Oliver dries himself off and then tugs on a pair of pajama pants and follows Roy out to the kitchen-slash-living room-slash-dining room. Roy has busied himself making a couple sandwiches. Oliver settles down to watch him work, musing a moment.

“Still having nightmares?” He breaks the silence at last, eyes sympathetic as he looks up at Roy. Who shakes his head a bit. “Not nightmares, exactly. Confusing, disturbing dreams, but not wake-up-screaming types.”

“Want to talk about it?” Oliver offers as he's slid a plate and picks up his sandwich.

Roy bites the inside of his cheek and then shakes his head after a moment of introspection. “Not with you.”

Oliver blinks a moment, stung by the comment, eyes a little wide as he lifts them to Roy, who thinks over what he'd said.

“Shit, Oliver, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. I mean,” he pauses a moment, thinking, “it's not something I _can_ talk to you about.”

Oliver furrows a brow. “You can talk to me about anything, Roy, you should know that. There's nothing that you've gone through that I haven't gone through. The torture, the feelings of guilt, the –”

“– the being in love with your ex-girlfriend and current boss' older brother?” Roy interrupts, chin lifted as his eyes bore into Oliver's challengingly.

“The... What?” Oliver's sandwich slips from his fingers back onto his plate. “I.. But.. No.”

Roy sets his jaw and takes a bite of his sandwich, chewing and swallowing with a hard cast to his features before it's his turn to break the silence, Oliver just staring at him the entire time. “And that's why I can't talk to you about it.”

Oliver blinks down at his mangled sandwich, then back up at Roy. “You've just been through a trauma, one which I happened to have rescued you from, and now you're here. With me. And I'm taking care of you, it's only natural that you _think_ you have those kinds of feelings –”

“No.” Roy cuts him off, blue eyes intense as they stare Oliver down. “You, Oliver Queen, are the _best_ man there is, and I don't love you because you rescued me once, but because you will _always_ rescue me.” He stabs a finger in the air, pointing at the older man. “You are not only my mentor, but my hero. And sure, you've got your flaws. You tend to run off half-cocked when your loved ones are threatened, and you run for the hills any time something like love is mentioned. But,” and this time Roy stab the table with his finger, “dammit Oliver, you're brave and caring, and you try so hard to live up to your ideal of yourself, and to protect others, and to give people like me and Barry the benefit of your experiences... You're incredible and I will _always_ love you.” He stands up and looks down at the table. “Now, I'm going back to bed and I don't ever want to talk about it again.”

Oliver opens his mouth, then closes it with a snap, then nods once, not watching Roy go, just burying his face in his hands and trying to wrap his mind around what had just happened.

Roy can't _possibly_... There's so many reasons why not.

He doesn't want to go through the kind of hurt that he's gone through over and over. Oliver has lost so much, he doesn't think he can survive any more loss. Roy's too young to get tangled up with someone like him anyway. And then there's the underlying problem. Love. Oliver figures that kind of feeling was destroyed on that island. But he doesn't really know how he feels about Roy now that a whole new light has been shed on everything. He'd taken Roy's affection as hero-worship, not, well, this.

He's still sitting there, puzzling through his own feelings, four hours later when Roy gets up with the dawning sun. He silently makes some coffee and sets a cup in front of Oliver, who automatically takes a sip, noting consciously, for the first time, that it's prepared exactly how he likes it.

Oliver finds it notable that he also knows how Roy takes his coffee, just two creams. But that's just the closeness of compatriots, right? He's pretty sure Diggle takes his black and Felicity likes some sort of caramel thing with whipped cream. Oliver thinks through all the things he knows about Roy, not the big secrets, but the tiny things, the small details that make up a person's habits. It surprises him how many of Roy's he can list.

And then Roy surprises him again, settling down across from him and asking Oliver the same question that he had answered so easily months past.

“Do you trust me?”

Oliver blinks up, considers, and realizes that he _does_ , thoroughly and completely. A smile spreads slowly across his lips as he nods and looks at Roy with a different light of appreciation.

“ _Always_.”

 

 


	3. Leaving

“ _I'm not leaving you.”_

Arsenal hisses the words at his green clad partner, who's taken an arrow to the knee and another to the thigh. He's field dressed the wounds as best he can, but there are hostages that he needs to get free, and the Arrow can't walk right now.

“You have to save these people, Arsenal,” Oliver says in his altered Arrow voice, and even through the modifier, Roy can hear the pain threading through it. “I'll be fine. GO.”

With one last look back, as the Arrow pulls back his bow and prepares to make a last stand, Roy sets his jaw and leads the hostages to safety – and freedom.

Once the last one is outside, Diggle herding them into the box van that Felicity has liberated for them, Roy turns to go back in. John puts a hand on his shoulder, maybe to say something, probably to try and stop him. Roy shrugs it off.

If Oliver's going down, then Roy's damn well going down with him.

He gets back to the place where he left Oliver, and he's _gone_. Roy swivels around in place, desperately looking for sign of his partner, but all the he sees is a fluttering of fabric far above him in the warehouse rafters. Roy looks around, then reaches out and shakes a shelving unit. It seems sturdy enough, and so he clambers over onto the first shelf and begins pulling himself upwards.

When he finally gets up there, after some incredibly acrobatic moves, he find the fluttering piece of fabric. He recognizes it somehow, and the memory of _where_ teases at him, as he crawls along the beam and scrambles through an opening, blinking in the harsh light that is shining right on the open hole.

“I told you to go,” comes Oliver's voice, still Arrow-rough through the modulator, and Roy nearly collapses in relief, might have at least given into a few deep breaths, but the soft murmur of a familiar voice threads through his awareness.

“Sa – _Canary_?” Roy steps from the spotlight and around to see her putting a splint on Oliver's leg.

“Good detective work, Arsenal.” She winks up at him before focusing on her task once more, and he has to look away. The false memories of him killing her are still strong and feels an obscure guilt still.

“I thought you were – ”

“Yeah, it was necessary.”

He nods and kneels down next to Oliver, who's just glaring with his jaw set. Roy settles his hand on the older man's cheek and says with his eyes what he can't with Sara there, with their relationship still no new, so undefined.

Oliver finally blinks away and then nods, unwilling to scold further, at least at this time.

Sara quietly helps Ollie up, and he slings an arm over both their shoulders, and together, they get the Arrow home.

Once Oliver's sleeping, with the help of some pain meds, Roy makes cocoa for himself and Sara.

She smiles her thanks and then toys with her mug.

“He's broken, you know. Lian Yu, what they did to him, what he had to do. It broke something inside him, Roy. He may never be able to love you back the way you deserve.”

Roy lifts his chin and arches his brows. “I don't care.”

Sara sets her hot chocolate down and studies Roy a long, long moment, then gets up and throws her arms around him in an impulsive hug. She smiles gently as she pulls back.

“Don't let him push you away.”

Roy sits and thinks for a long time after Sara leaves, stretched out on his bed and staring at the ceiling. He only just dropped off into a half-doze, filled with nebulous ghosts of dreams about Oliver being in mortal peril, when he hears the crash of something falling into the sink out in the kitchen.

In the time it takes for his heart to beat twice, Roy's heading for the kitchen, armed with an arrow in one hand, and a pair of scissors in the other. He tosses them down in disgust when he sees that Oliver is up rummaging around for food.

“You shouldn't be up,” he says, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall.

“Go back to bed, Roy, I'm fine,” Oliver says as he limps, even his infamous stoicism unable to hide the pain that it cases him.

“You're an idiot,” Roy tells him, reaching out to take the can of processed can of junk off the table as Oliver reaches for a fork. “And this, this is not food.”

Oliver holds out his hand imperiously for the can and Roy shakes his head at it. “At least let me cook you something.”

The older man limps the step forward and snatches the can from Roy's hand. “I don't need your help, Roy.” _I don't need you._

It hangs in the air between them a long moment, and Roy turns on his heel and steps away into the darkness of their living room.

 _He doesn't mean it_ , Roy tells himself, _he's just trying to drive you away, like Sara said_. It doesn't help, it still stings, and it's all Roy can do to squash the hurt down and think about what Oliver needs right now.

Once he's certain he can keep control of himself, Roy stomps back into the kitchen, taking Oliver by surprise, and flicks the can right from the table into the trash. Without a word, Roy pulls out a couple pans and sets them on the stove and then starts pulling things from the fridge and setting them on the counter. He cooks in silence, completely ignoring Oliver though he feels the older man's gaze like a brand between his shoulder blades.

Roy plates the perfectly done omelette, adds sausage links and hashbrowns, with a side plate for the toast. He settles down a cup of orange juice in front of Oliver, along with the two plates of food, all without saying a word, and then Roy takes himself to bed.

Only then does he let himself feel the hurt, silent tears falling onto his pillow. Roy indulges himself in the emotion, gives himself about twenty minutes, and then wipes his face, and turns over, falling into a thankfully dreamless sleep.

It's dark when he wakes up, and it takes Roy a few minutes to orient himself, to check his phone and realize that he slept a whole day away. He groans and stretches, wandering out to see if Oliver needs anything.

He checks the living room and kitchen, and then the older man's bedroom.

Oliver is gone.

-

“You seen Oliver today?” Roy does his best to sound casual, but Felicity immediately picks up on the tight thread of worry in his voice.

“No, Roy, just a sec and I'll track him.”

He waits, fist clenching and unclenching.

“He's on the roof.”

Roy remembers how to breathe, thanks her, and then grabs a coat, follows the path that Oliver must have taken. The older man is hunched in a position that can't possibly be comfortable, and staring out at the horizon, out towards where the Glades used to be.

“I can't do this, Roy.”

He doesn't say a word as he quietly walks over and settles down next to Oliver.

“The part of me that could love, that could feel things, that Oliver died on the island.”

Roy remains quiet, but he leans in and rests his head on Oliver's shoulder, watches the horizon as well as Oliver stumbles through his explanations of why they could never work. He ignores all the excuses that are put forth and closes his eyes.

“You're not even listening.”

“Nope,” Roy says, popping the 'p', “didn't hear a word.”

“ _Roy_ ,” Oliver begins, exasperated, but the younger man doesn't let him finish. Roy lifts his head, turns and presses his lips softly to Oliver's, calmly rests his cheek back on the taller man's shoulder and looks into the sunset. Oliver stiffens in surprise and stares down at Roy, eyes wide a long moment, then he sighs and settles his arm around the younger man.

“This is not going to work, you know.”

Roy stifles a fake yawn. “You're starting to repeat yourself.”

Oliver snorts a laugh in spite of himself. “Dammit, Roy, I'm being serious here. You need to go find someone that can give you what you deserve.”

“You said you trusted me, Oliver.”

“I do, Roy, I don't see – ”

“Oliver,” Roy interrupts, “ I swear this, on everything I hold dear.” He turns his face to look seriously into the older man's eyes. “Whatever comes, whatever happens between us, come hell or high water – ”

Oliver's eyes flick away and down, and Roy cups the other man's chin in his hands, forcing his attention back to his partner.

“ _I'm not leaving you.”_

 


	4. Again

“ _Again.”_

Oliver growls the word out, low and fierce as he beckons Roy to come at him once more, settling into his stance, holding the wooden pole that they train with loosely in his fist and waiting for the rush.

Roy complies, gives nearly as good as he gets, never once protesting the new drive in his partner to train him to more than exacting standards.

He knows that Oliver's trying his best to cope with the possibility that he will lose Roy, and takes the fervor in which he prepares for that eventuality, as a good sign that Oliver's beginning to open up to his feelings. So he doesn't complain when he limps his way into the shower, hisses as the hot water beats into aching muscles and fresh bruises. He doesn't even bother to look at himself in the mirror when he gets out, just wraps the towel around himself and heads into his room. He's just tugged on a pair of sweats, loosely settling low slung on his hips as Oliver knocks on the door and then pokes his head in.

“You feel like pizza- _Oh_.” He steps in, thoughts of food gone as he spies the purple-black markings across the younger man's back. Oliver takes two steps forward before he can stop himself, images of the beatings he'd overseen when he'd been imprisoned, welts and bruises covering men who could no longer rise, and Oliver is suddenly filled with self-loathing for what he's done to Roy.

The younger man turns to nod his assent for pizza, reads every emotion as it flashes through Oliver's eyes, and reaches out to grab his wrist before the taller man can run.

“Pizza's fine,” he says, looking up into Oliver's eyes. “The bruises will heal. No big deal.” Roy's in the very odd position of being the one with the experience here. Because Oliver was known as a playboy and he's had flings and casual lovers, but he's never had _this_ , something with the weight of a relationship behind it.

Oliver tugs his wrist free of Roy's grip and vanishes from the room, and Roy buries his face in his hands, trying to figure out how he's going to fix this. He's surprised when Ollie appears again in the doorway, with a clear jar full of something a disturbing shade of green.

“This will help,” he says, and Roy wrinkles up his nose.

“I'd rather have the bruises, thanks.” But Oliver pays him no mind, just scoops some on his fingers and slides it along one of the welts. Roy hisses at the first contact, but it quickly turns into a moan as the pain turns into a warmth that spread across his back. After about three minutes, Roy feels like melting, and he's trying to conceal his very physical reaction to the feeling, or maybe to having Oliver's hands all over him. Either way, Roy's fairly certain that Oliver is not ready for any of that, so he shifts to keep it hidden. It works, right up until Oliver, focused on his task, tugs injudiciously at the towel, and it falls free before Roy can grab it. He reaches but Oliver stops him, tugs Roy to turn around slowly.

Oliver reaches for the green cream and starts rubbing it on the bruises along Roy's front, and he curls his hands into fists, because he doesn't know what to do here. He wills his erection to go down, but given that Oliver's hands are moving lower along his body, he's fighting a losing battle.

Oliver rubs his thumb along Roy's left hipbone and Roy closes his eyes, taking several deep breaths.

“Roy... Can I...” Oliver trails off as if he doesn't know quite what to say, but Roy's quick to jump in.

“Yeah. Anything. Whatever you want.” He's hoping against hope but he doesn't actually expect it when Oliver's hand slides gently underneath Roy's cock, lifting it up slightly before curling his fingers around. Roy bites his lips so hard it bleeds as Oliver slowly draws his hand along the thickness in his hand, intent on what he's doing. Roy feels that if he moves, if he startles Oliver, he might not get this moment again and so he holds on tightly to himself.

“Roy, I'd like to – ”

“Yes!” Roy blurts out, interrupting Oliver, and the latter can't help a soft chuckle as he leans in and brushes his lips, feather light, across Roy's lips. Roy's eyes flutter closed as Oliver does it again, this time with more pressure. Oliver's hand around his dick tightens, and Roy can't help but sway forward into him.

Oliver slides his free hand around the small of Roy's back as he slides his tongue along the seam of the shorter man's lips, which part easily for him. Oliver's tentative at first, but gains confidence, exploring Roy's mouth while he increases the rhythm of his hand, and suddenly it's all too much for Roy, who shudders in Oliver's grasp, spilling hotly all over the archer's fingers.

Oliver parts the kiss slowly, gently disengaging his hand as Roy shakily sits on the edge of the bed. He steps back into the bathroom to clean himself off as Roy falls back onto the bed, just drifting in afterglow.

It takes Roy a while to notice that Oliver is taking way too long to wash his hands. He props himself up on his elbows, but the bathroom light isn't on. Roy rises, thinks to stop and tug a pair of pajama pants on, and goes looking for Oliver.

The apartment is empty.

With a sigh, Roy climbs up to the roof. “You're getting predictable, Oliver.”

“I'm sorry, Roy, I shouldn't have taken advantage of you.”

Roy blinks and – he can't help it – laughs. “You _what_?”

He plops down right on Oliver, shaking his head at the older man. “First, Oliver Queen, that was _absolutely not_ taking advantage of me.”

Oliver blinks down at Roy but makes no move to eject the smaller man from his lap.

“And, two, you absolutely should have. Consider this blanket permission for anything.”

Oliver shakes his head, “You can't possibly – ”

Roy grabs his face and kisses him deeply, then looks into his eyes. “ _Anything_.”

Oliver considers a long moment, and Roy has the sinking feeling that he's pushed too hard, when Oliver displays the flexibility that Roy so envies and unfolds, lifting Roy in his arms and somehow managing to get all the way back into their apartment without letting go.

Roy _really_ shouldn't be as turned on by that as he is. He's seen Oliver do more incredible things, but this time, it's all for him.

Ollie carries Roy right into his own bedroom, and lays him out on the bed, eyes dark but serious as he crawls over the younger man.

“Are you _sure_?”

“Oliver Queen if you don't get around to doing whatever it is you're going to do, I'm going to get going right out of here.”

“Well,” Oliver says, lifting Roy's wrists above his head and holding them there with one hand, “we can't have that can we?” His eyes rake over Roy's body as he tugs the pajama pants down once again, and then back up to the younger man's face. “Do you have any idea how gorgeous you are?”

The words take Roy's breath away. Anyone else and he would have had something sarcastic for a return, but Oliver _never_ says things like that. Roy swallows hard past the lump in his throat, a new swell of tenderness for the archer suffusing him. Before the shorter man can think of something to say in return, Oliver's free hand slips beneath Roy, tentatively sliding into the cleft below and rubbing the pad of his finger in a spiral around the furled muscle there.

“Oh god, Oliver, _yes_ ,” Roy grinds out when Ollie looks up and parts his lips to ask permission again.

That's all that he needs, apparently, because Oliver's shucking off his own clothing, _finally_ , all of his attention bent to his purpose. And having all of Oliver Queen's intensity focused on making love to him is something Roy was not prepared for. He feels thoroughly taken care of by the time Oliver presses inside him, and when Oliver's hand wraps around his cock again, matching his motions to the rhythm he's setting below, Roy sees fireworks and stars and all the other cliches that people use to describe it. It's incredible and amazing and he tells Oliver so in a shaky voice when the archer pulls Roy close and wraps tightly around him.

“Thank you, Roy,” he whispers, face buried in the younger man's neck, a crystal tear sliding down his cheek. “Thank you for not giving up on me.”

Roy nestles back into Oliver's embrace, sated and drowsy, and feeling so very loved.

“I love you, Ollie,” he mumbles, “You couldn't get rid of me if you tried.”

Oliver chuckles against the nape of Roy's neck and kisses it softly. He continues pressing kisses across Roy's neck and shoulders, hands drifting across the sculpted planes of Roy's body, until he has to turn and looks up at his new lover.

“ _Really_ , Ollie?”

“Mmhmm,” Oliver hums as he idly flicks one of Roy's nipples.

“ _Again_.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Inspiration: Wake Me Up by Avicii


End file.
